King crowns Spanish bid for 2016 Olympics

If a winning Olympic bid depended solely on its technical quality and on popular support, Madrid should be levitating en route to the October 2 vote in Copenhagen.

But the race to host the Games is often tough and unrewarding, something the half a million people who gathered on Sunday in Madrid's downtown to support the bid might not be aware of.

Mercedes Coghen, an Olympic field hockey medallist in Barcelona 1992 and CEO of the Madrid bid, admitting to "bittersweet" feelings when the International Olympic Committee (IOC) evaluation commission report was published on September 2.

Rio de Janeiro's presentation of the bid was described as "very high quality," while Chicago's and Tokyo's were called "high quality." In the case of Madrid, however, IOC officials only said the bid's presentation "varied in quality."

"We are not good communicators," Coghen said at the time, adding of her feelings: "Sweet because they have seen that our project is good, bitter because we have not been good at explaining it."

"The Spanish media put the accent on the presentations, though the report was very, very good for Madrid", Coghen told German Press Agency dpa.

Being incapable of selling one's project is no small matter when you depend on 106 IOC members of very different nationalities, cultures and age groups.

These communication shortcomings were striking for a country whose Juan Antonio Samaranch was IOC president 1980-2001 and that hosted one of the best Olympics 1992 in Barcelona.

Madrid 2016 says it can count on Samaranch's support and experience, although at the beginning of the 2016 race it did not follow his advice.

"If Rio and Madrid can come to an agreement before the election, that would be very good," Samaranch told German Press Agency dpa in July 2007.

The former IOC boss was in Rio for the Pan-American Games at the time, and well aware of Rio's most powerful asset, bidding to host the first Olympics in South America.

Coghen said stepping down was not an option for Madrid, whose delegation in Copenhagen is led by King Juan Carlos.

But as things stand, the city knows that it will not be able to count on the Hispanic world in the first round of voting, although bid officials also know that they will get those votes back if they progress a round further than Rio.

This is Madrid's third attempt to host the Olympics, after most recently losing out for 2012.

Beyond the bid's own mistakes and successes, Madrid carries a burden that cannot be blamed on Coghen and her team, the "Operacion Puerto" doping saga which remains unsolved.

"Madrid's problem is that 'Operacion Puerto' continues to have aftershocks," one IOC member told dpa, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) also made Madrid's bid stumble, by forcing late changes in Spain's anti-doping legislation to avoid trouble for the Olympic bid.

"We are at the forefront of the global doping battle, this is something I would like to emphasize", Coghen told dpa.

Between bitter and sweet moments, the Spain of sporting success -a European champion in football and basketball, a world power in tennis, strong in athletics and reborn in swimming - is trying to find a way to show itself in the best possible light.

With King Juan Carlos, Queen Sofía and Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero in Copenhagen, the goal of Madrid's bid is threefold: surviving the first vote, strengthening itself as a "second option" for IOC members and scraping a handful of votes that could be crucial for Madrid to reach once again the home stretch of the race for the Olympics.

By Sebastian Fest